


Since

by Sarie_Fairy



Series: Fictober 2020 [4]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Episode: s03e02 Paper Clip, F/M, MSR, car drives and conversations, fictober20, post Melissa Scully's death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:14:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26805682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sarie_Fairy/pseuds/Sarie_Fairy
Summary: FICTOBER Day 4 - Prompt: “all I ever wanted.”Post Paperclip. Mulder gives Scully a lift from the hospital, and they talk. (Post Missy's death)
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Series: Fictober 2020 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1951573
Comments: 10
Kudos: 59





	Since

Had she been in that hard chair—the first time she had sat down _since_ —for an hour, a day, eternity? Letting him hold her, needing him to. 

In the car, the first time _since_ , she felt close to him, bound somehow, as he drove her, the direction of her mother’s she suspected. She didn’t question him, didn’t want to think. 

Like every nerve was frayed, she felt raw and exposed.

“We’ve both lost a sister, and a father now, you and I, Mulder,” she offered. “What a frightful thing to have in common.”

He glanced at her, winced and reached for her hand, that was resting in her lap—large palm—engulfing in comfort. Grasping at him, she sandwiched his hand between her two, pulling him closer. His forearm in a hug.

“How ya doin’?” he coaxed, gently.

“I just, I’m having trouble believing that she’s truly gone.” She focused beyond the window and took a steadying breath. “That I won’t get to feel how Missy loves me. Not ever again. How she sees me. Do you know what I mean?” she asked, absently threading her fingers between his, turning back to him.

“I think I do,” he sighed, rubbing her wrist with the pad of his thumb.

“I felt like that, after Dad. But -- all I ever wanted was to make him proud. And he was, I think, but -- but it was harder to see myself how he did. I always felt that he wanted a little more.”

One hand gripping the wheel, Mulder shared his attention between the road and glances across at her, as she spoke. 

She took in a breath, holding her emotions at a precipice. 

“With Missy -- she marvelled at me Mulder,” she breathed, watching all that whizzed by outside of the car in the dark of night, all that they passed—the first time _since_. Through emotion preceding her tears, she continued, “I liked myself through her eyes,” she managed before she spilled, tears overflowing, trailing down her damp, red cheeks.

“Oh, Scully,” he soothed between her sobs, “I see you. I do,” he implored.

She roughly swiped at her cheeks, her nose with the cuff of her shirt.

“And I like you very much. You’re my most favourite person actually.”

She laughed, a laugh and a cry combined, and she squeezed his hand, “thank you.”

Taking a few deep breaths, she closed her eyes in thought momentarily, then requested: “Mulder, take me home. To your place”, she clarified. “It’s too far to drive, and I can go to my mom’s in the morning.”

“Okay, if that’s what you want.”

“It is. I’ll call her. Bill will be there by now, so she’s not alone.”

Mulder’s dark, familiar apartment was a different world, one that had never included her sister. And she could hide out there for the night, with Mulder. Just a little while more before she would start again tomorrow—face all the places, the memories, the ghosts now; _since_.

“You’ve lost someone too,” she explained further, “and we’ve both been through so much. And I don’t really want you out of my sight at the moment.”

He smiled, a well-worn melancholic kind of smile and nodded to her. “Okay. I’ll take you home,” he said and held her hand a little tighter. 

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be posting something new, in the Fictober 2020 series, each day in October for Fictober, run on Tumblr, from this[ prompt list](https://fictober-event.tumblr.com/post/628547358001594368/fictober-event-the-prompts-for-2020%22).  
> Thank you for reading 💕


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